Misbah warns Oz to be wary of India's spinners at 'spin-friendly' SCG pitch ahead of WC semifinal tie

Pakistan cricket team captain Misbah-ul Haq has backed India to have an advantage over Australia in their World Cup semifinal tie at the Sydney Cricket Ground because he feels that the defending champions' spinners would make the difference there.

Australia defeated Pakistan by six wickets and 97 balls in hand, as they chased down Misbah's men's 213-run target in the quarterfinal tie to advance to the World Cup semifinals, where they would face India, who have progressed in the tournament without conceding a defeat so far.

Misbah said that both Australia and India were in good form ahead of their semifinal, but predicted that conditions at the SCG would favour India, Stuff.co.nz reported.

The skipper said that India have got a chance because they are playing in Sydney and added that the Sydney pitch everybody knows there's a little bit for the spinners, and he insisted that both the defending champions' spinners, Ravichandran Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja, were bowling well.

Misbah added that Australia are a very balanced team, but he believes that playing in Sydney they might just miss a good spinner and claimed that that could be the difference there.

Misbah said that when they played against England at the SCG the spinners got success on that pitch, and added that in the quarterfinal Imran Tahir got wickets against Sri Lanka. He insisted that that could be a problem for Australia, and added that playing against spin could also spell trouble for them there.

However, Clarke dismissed Misbah's comments, pointing to Australia's experience in their most recent match at the SCG, earlier in the month. He said that he doesn't believe a ball spun in the game they played against Sri Lanka.

The Australian skipper believes that it would depend on what wicket gets prepared, claiming that the game that was played there recently looked like it had a bit of grass on it so that would certainly help their fast bowlers if it's like that, insisting that if it does spin, then they have got spinning options in their squad.